the multi-purpose one

i have yet earned a few other titles in the office this week.since the talk-which-led-nowhere with the boss, i’ve been approaching every single colleague to see if they have anything they want me to do, anything. each time i approach them (i have a routine, asking each of them starting from my favourite colleague to the backstabber, till they run out of things for me to do), they behave like i’m their saviour, releasing them from the life-of-overtime.

i’m also amazed by the speed i complete their tasks. i’ve yet to stay overtime, with my workload and chunks of others’ workloads. therefore, they’ve crowned me the high-speed and high-performance one. which makes me sound like some technology product.

yesterday, i took up the most hilarious task ever. hilarious to me, at least.

my admin head approached me to help with the folding of joss paper. no kidding, joss paper. the kind that’s burnt during taoist prayers, etc. she looked so guilty asking me, cos she thought i might mind doing such things when it’s obviously way beyond my workscope, that i burst out laughing. i assured her i’m totally okay with it, i’m just amused by the “colourful worklife” i have.

my neighbour-in-black shook her head and laughed when she saw the stacks of joss paper, the black trash bags i took to contain the folded joss paper, and the way i cleaned the tables after the folding session.

thus the additional title of “the multi-purpose one” was earned.

now i sound like a household detergent.

the joss paper folding thingy wasn’t so bad, really. it’s better than staying in my cubicle, which is dangerously near the backstabbing-triangle in the office, consisting of the uncool admin ladies. the uncool admin ladies refer to the others minus the admin head, the neighbour-in-black and me. the sitting arrangement is such that the neighbour-in-black and the admin head are safely situated far away from the backstabbing-trio. but i’m at the border of the triangle and things really get a little hot at times.

things within the triangle are gonna get worse when my admin head goes on her maternity leave. cos the most senior backstabber has been appointed the temporary admin head. and at the rate things are happening to me (plus the things she’s been saying to me the past few days), it’s not gonna be a pleasant stay for me till my admin head returns.

the joss-paper session also allowed my admin head and i to indulge in a long gossip session, when i learnt a lot more about the people in the office. gossip in the office is restricted to non-malicious descriptions of people and events which happen, so that we have better understanding of things going on around us. not the untrue, harmful kind.

so it was kind of educational too. really.

in case you are really interested in why we were folding joss paper, it’s solely for the purpose of the seventh month prayer session on monday. so it’s kind of like an annual duty for the most-free people in the office to help with the folding.